Action picks up for O.C. filming

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In a scene from the upcoming movie “Star Trek Into Darkness,” Captain Kirk addresses a uniformed crowd seated at an official gathering before a shiny silver edifice. Science fiction fans are speculating online that the futuristic building may be Starfleet Command, headquarters for a central organization in the fictional world of the long-running Star Trek franchise.

Some Orange County church-goers don't have to speculate at all. The real-world building that actor Chris Pine stands before is the “Welcoming Center” of what was called the Crystal Cathedral when that scene was shot last year in Garden Grove.

Director J.J. Abrams, whose film comes out May 17, is just one of many filmmakers who have hauled their casts, crews and equipment outside of Hollywood to shoot movies, TV shows and commercials in Orange County. More professional film projects are taking place on county-owned property these days than any other time in the past six years.

Vendors spent $105 million on goods and services related to location shoots in Orange County in 2010, according to the most recent report provided by the Motion Picture Association of America. That includes payments to government agencies for permits and money spent on hotel stays, food and fuel, among other things.

That amount is a far cry from Orange County's filmmaking heyday. County film commissioner Janice Arrington says film vendors spent as much as $335.2 million in 2002. But Arrington is much busier these days, as are location managers and the film commissioners of California cities.
The county issued 15 permits to shoot projects on its property in 2009, not including student projects. Last year, that number more than doubled, to 35. The last time volume was higher was 2001.

Filmmakers flock to Orange County to fit particular storylines. Disneyland was a natural fit for “Saving Mr. Banks,” an upcoming film that stars Tom Hanks as Walt Disney.

A Rossmoor cul-de-sac played a Chicago neighborhood in the Rob Lowe TV movie “Drew Peterson: Untouchable.”

And Oliver Stone's “Savages” used Laguna Beach as a backdrop and for inspiration, based on a Don Winslow novel about the local drug scene.

Location managers also are pulled in by architecture. They visit Orange when they're looking for a “small town” backdrop, said Paul Sitkoff, business manager for the city. “If next year the trend is for futuristic cities, some other city will probably get the nod.”

That was the case for Garden Grove and the former Crystal Cathedral, which appears in the 23rd-century setting of the new “Star Trek” film, in which the crew of the Enterprise spacecraft hunts for those who attacked their Starfleet organization. As far back as 1972, UCI played a futuristic 1991 world where humans were enslaved by apes in “Conquest of the Planet of the Apes.”

The county handles permits for filming on county property, which includes harbors, beaches, parks, roads, John Wayne Airport and historical buildings such as the Old Orange County Courthouse in Santa Ana.

Arrington was involved with the two-day closure of the 73 toll road last year, when the highway was used by Warner Bros. to shoot scenes for “The Hangover Part 3.” In a trailer for the upcoming movie, a giraffe is towed down the road by Zach Galifianakis. The computer-generated animal flips its ears back just before it appears to hit a sign for the University Drive and MacArthur Boulevard exits.

“This was the first freeway closure for filming in Orange County,” noted Arrington.

Individual cities are in charge of issuing the rights to film within their jurisdictions, and permit requirements vary.

Some cities, such as Laguna Beach, require permits only for filming on public property. Elsewhere, permits are also needed to shoot on private property.

Santa Ana has already issued 10 non-student permits this year, including commercials for Verizon and Wienerschnitzel. For all of last year, 19 permits were issued.

Filming in much of Orange County incurs additional costs for film production firms. They have to pay extra fees to union members when a project takes them beyond a circular region that extends 30 miles from the intersection of Beverly Boulevard and La Cienega Boulevard near West Hollywood. The boundary of this “30-mile zone” cuts through the Seal Beach Naval Weapons Station and continues northeast to one block west of the Brea Mall.

Regardless of location, studios were simply spending less, and shooting for fewer days, in 2009.

“The state was facing a double whammy,” Arrington said. “The Great Recession was in full swing, and states like Louisiana, New York and New Mexico were luring producers away with incentives to shoot in their states.”

In 2009, the California Film Commission began to provide tax credits for qualifying filmmakers, based on legislation initiated by ex-actor and then-Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The county has been recovering since mid-2011, Arrington said. “We're getting the episodics, like ‘Dexter' and ‘90210.' Companies are spending on location work again.”

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